Just one new track tonight, it was actually released yesterday and it gives us the opportunity to introduce another artist we haven't featured before, Vetle Forsell . So Forsell is a young gender fluid singer/songwriter from Norway, born in the beautiful town of 'Stavenger' and who learnt to play music on an old piano in the family house, before also learning to play guitar. Musically influenced by the likes of 'Sufjan Stevens' (as everyone should be), 'The Beatles' and interestingly 'Pink Floyd' too, there is an expansive side to the music, which is distinctly folk influenced but with a cinematic feel.
Anyway it's Vetle Forsell's experiences growing up that have been key to developing songwriting skills, and in particular the 12 songs on a forthcoming 2019 album entitled 'Pictures in Frames' - with 12 tracks that deal with stories of ''otherness, gender confusion, anxiety, loss and psychosis''. Indeed debut release 'In Waiting' deals with an event Forsell experienced when visiting Australia, where after a psychotic break his father had to travel across the world to a hospital institution in order for them to be reconciled together and for him to be brought home.
Now if you're all thinking that this sounds rather dark, well no actually it isn't really. Of course the lyrics are very powerful and deal with the episode head on, the vocals melancholy and thoughtfully delivered, but there's this uplifting tone to the chorus and the lyrics that do give a feeling that there is hope - because there always is hope. Anyway I've listened to 'In Waiting' to so many times, there's a purity to the vocals that I love, and perfectly judged instrumentation to support it, with beautiful soft melodies that carries the song forward.
This is 'In Waiting':
It's probably not quite right to quote someone else's writing in the context of this lovely songwriting from Vetle Forsell, but the concept of 'In Waiting' does remind me of the incredible Matt Haig and his writing - there's a paragraph somewhere in 'Reasons to Stay Alive' about 'waiting' that is equally powerful.
Anyway we're already really looking forward to that 'Vetle Forsell' album, due in May 2019, entitled 'Pictures in Frames'.